Soya

Infographic of the day!!
Yes we are using lots more of soya lately... Soya milk is a good replacement for regular dihorrea inducing and phlegm increasing milk. We make ours at he sometimes. And the pulp that remains (okara) goes in the making of some super healthy cookies that I'm gaining a fan-base of!

Misery

Misery is mysterious. You know the formula for not being miserable. Yet this formula is never available to you when miserable. 
Misery is full of lethargy, bummery and thoughtlessness. 
Chai, chocolate, mindless TV shows and relentless Google searches for nothing are what it is made of and antisocialness is just a by-product of all that. Plus nobody will want to be around you anyway. 
The current cause of my state is directionlessness. I suppose this is a feeling I share with many of my designer/ architect/ urban designer peers at this moment. We post-recession lot are known to be this way... And there is no obvious place to go from here.

BFF.. ?

Inspired by the drawings dear friend and foodie blogger buddy (yes, she draws AND cooks!)... here's my newest ceramic piece, in progress....

But first, the drawing I'm using: 

http://hushtosee.blogspot.in/2012/07/blog-post_842.html

 Go look at the poem that goes with it... it makes it more worth it. 

Just traced- the paper fibers left behind will get fried in the kiln.

Windows

Some details

All the textures

So another round of finalizing the lines and making it more crisp will finish this project, ready to be fired later this week... 

And then it will be (nearly) set in stone, this friendship... 

Mindspace

We all pine for silence, peace and 'shanti'. And if you live in Bombay, this is an every day phenomena. It has always been a point of disgust to me that our country with its numerous religions is so damn NOISY. The song and dance and chants and bells and everything that accompanies this- the people and the chatter and the laughs and the rumbling of feet and the smell of sweat (nothing to do with the noise, but terrible nonetheless)... ugh... Terrible. 

On the other hand, you go to the west and silence prevails. In Switzerland people even wear ear plugs (christened 'ear tampons' bu a good friend) at concerts and gatherings. In fact, they're distributed by the sponsors in neat little boxes with cars on the cover (?). These people just aren't used to noise. They're sensitive even to the stranger's footsteps, waking 3 floors downstairs in stiff boots with his dog at 10PM at night. This is the mark of an apparently 'civilized' society, I suppose. No noise. Each to themselves. Their Mindspace. Their audio space. 

And I say this is how they disconnect themselves more and more from their surroundings and their people. There is no collective if you don't hear them and if they don't 'invade' your mindspace. 

In India you are bombarded with the sound of society- whether you like them or not (it is no wonder not many Indians commit suicide out of loneliness). 

But I think there's a more esoteric explanation here. Our ancient civilizations discovered that true happiness lies in keeping the mind's chatter at bay. The mind has a tendency to stop us from achieving our goals and according to Vedic and Yogic culture, it is best to take measures to keep it as calm and silent as possible. This act brings one closer to the Consciousness or God or the Universe (or whatever else you might want to call it). And that is why we chant and meditate- to keep the mind silent, to focus the energies elsewhere and to ultimately be an observer of the mind as opposed to a partaker of its chatter. And that is why we sing and chant in groups- an act that ultimately silences the mind. And that is why our country is so noisy. Not to bombard your mindspace with religious and political propaganda, not to disrupt your personal silent musings. But rather to silence the chatter of a restless mind and bring you closer to the real happiness, not an imaginary one that involves silent streets, silent people and silent lives. 

 

Lemons... are pretty good.

I've been thinking lately about the psychology of cleanliness.

I started using the Spaghetti Scrubber lately and the box said you need to use little or no soap and it will still clean the dishes well. It took me a while to get used to this- since frothliness equals cleanliness to my mind. So I tried it out a bit, but I always needed a visible foam. So I researched on some homemade cleaning agents and discovered none of them (largely lemon, vinegar and baking soda) foamed. 

Another time I was in a largely Malayali supermarket and I discovered some hair and body 'cleaners' made of natural soapnut and shikakai. No, they weren't soaps or shampoos, but powders that are mixed with water and used. Eeks! No dollops of foam to lift off my head and blow with a seductive 'fffooooo'? Not happening! 

But some months of using lemon peels with water (and a drop of soap because I can't resist) for washing the dishes has proven to be quite fruitful. The leftover water from washing (which I collect) can now be used for many more things than before. 

And then my dad told me of the most traditional way of washing dishes- sand or charcoal as the medium and a scrunched jute rope as applicator. Huh... No foam. Well. So foam is this modern day brainwash to make us feel clean. 

Yes that is the blunt conclusion to this article. Enjoy. 

Image Credit

Pondering Embroidery

Embroidery can't just be confined to fabric. Rather, it shouldn't be. It should break away from not just fabric, but this 2D plane and take on new forms.

This is a photograph/ embroidery experiment by Richard Burbridge & Robbie Spencer (I think.... I found it and saved it a while ago). I love the way the threads are used to not only enhance but perhaps pull the message of the photograph in a different direction. I also love the parabolas he creates with these fading threads... it isn't like geometry in a school book but has a dimension to it. You know which threads are above and which are below. There is a texture to it and I find that interesting. Also the way the parabolas are drawn from the eye, to the ear, through the neck and to the edge of the dress.... makes me wonder about his work process... How would he have started? Would he have taken tracing papers over the photograph and drawn lines through to see what could emerge? or would he have imagined the embroidery first and then choreographed the photo? Or would he have just looked at the photo, pondered a bit, and KNOWN what to do?

Here's another one by the same duo. This one also has the geometry, but adds this hairy quality to it... Thread can be unpredictable and takes the shape of what is given to it. But when given no shape, it follows the wind. Here the thread wants to do that but is pinned down at some points by this geometrical thread, pulled taught, doing what it is supposed to do. I've never imagined using thread this way, so this picture actually jolted me a bit.And you know what... THIS is the thread's true expression. Not the geometry. Not the pretty little flowers and daisies we embroider on handkys and kids' clothes. THIS is thread.

Here's a project where X (I don't know who this person is...) draws architecture with thread. I'm not sure what this project does. I don't think the thread adds anything to the 'drawing'. There is perhaps the minor texture... but for most part, it seems like a different medium to do the same thing. The thread is imitating the pen here (the pen only used with a straight edge, mind you... for the thread can make only straight lines in this case). It isn't being itself. It isn't doing the amazing things it can do.... So I think this experiment doesn't do anything. For me, at least. 

Here's an experiment that I did with kiddie clay. I made large versions of some common stitches... 3D. The orange is chain stitch, pink is buttonhole, red is herringbone, blue/green is stem and the yellow is a close-knit version of buttonhole. What emerges are these 3D forms that can be made into objects... for example I can totally see how the (pink) buttonhole one can become a bowl eventually (I ran out of clay). 

But again, this isn't 'embroidery' in the traditional sense anymore. It is something else. In my mind it seems to follow these evolutionary steps... from stitch (always needing 2D cloth support) to a weave (like macrame or a braid that doesn't require 2D support) to this (blowup of the thread into a material with strength and rigidity).

So again, my question is, what else can embroidery do? Is it confined to this 2D plane? Is it confined to these forms we give it? Can it not be something structural, rather than something decorative? Can it evolve? 

I'm currently exploring these ideas through my ceramics... so... stay tuned.

My desk

A blurry view of where something happens. Not magic. Something. Brainfarts? Yes.

I've been spending more and more time here, considering I'm no longer a (c) Corporate Slut (phrase coined and patented by cool friend in Zuri :) ) ... and it feels pretty good. For now I'm just learning. I experiment and I put myself in other people's shoes (I scour the net for pictures of handmade things and say "hey! I can do that!", then i do it and improvise); I draw and paint a bit; but most of all, I work with clay. It is my meditation, my soul, my life force and my prevention against rheumatism.
More of that shall follow soon enough...

Yellow

What is it about yellow light that reduces your memory to one frame per minute? Life slows down. Dust flies slower, food is consumed slower... even cats stop mid-roll to have their bellies catch some yellow.... Ah, nothing like some yellow light, I say!